All Posts
Famous Poems as Limericks
Boing Boing, the self-styled "directory of wonderful things" posted a link yesterday to a collection of limericks based on famous…
Recommended Reads: Poppy Shakespeare
I have just finished reading Poppy Shakespeare by Clare Allen. Set in a North London day hospital, Allen draws on…
First Annual Troubadour Poetry Prize
Angela Macmillan has drawn my attention to the first annual Troubadour Poetry Prize, judged by Helen Dunmore and David Constantine.…
Harry Potter and the Double-Edged Sword
The release of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows on July 21st concludes one of the best-selling and most controversial…
The Rushdie Knighthood
Over at the Kenyon Review blog Sergei Lobanov-Rostovsky has written a provocative post reflecting on the implications of Salman Rushdie's…
The Patron Saint of Bloggers
It was probably inevitable that Samuel Pepys, the most famous diarist in history, should have a blog dedicated to him.…
Armistead Maupin in Liverpool on July 4, 2007
On Independence Day 2007, Armistead Maupin, one of America’s greatest living gay writers will be appearing at a special event…
Philip Pullman–Favourite Children’s Novelist
To mark the 70th award of the Carnegie Medal, the annual award for children's writers, Philip Pullman has been voted…
Are you deciding what to read?
As an inveterate browser of bookshops I've only occasionally allowed myself to be sucked in by the 3-for-2 deals on…
Strangers and Strange Worlds: Readers’ Day Saturday 7th July 2007
Hosted by The Reader in association with Archbishop Blanch High School. If you love reading then you'll love the Readers'…
Michael Rosen on Reading for Pleasure
Michael Rosen, who was appointed Children's Laureate yesterday, is well known as a critic of British education policy, especially when…
Find Time to Read
When academics and teachers get together one of the most common complaints they have about their students is that "young…